Efforts by C.I.A. Fail in Somalia, Officials Charge

[seemslikeadream]

Would some one with a Times sub post a bit of this article?


http://www.nytimes.com/glogin?URI=http://www.nytimes.com/2006/06/08/world/africa/08intel.html&OQ=_rQ3D1Q26exQ3D1167973200Q26enQ3D0f4c08c9ea9ba94aQ26eiQ3D5070&OP=5605e038Q2FQ7Dh@Q5BQ7DT5Q22Q26Q2B55-JQ7DJLLQ7EQ7DLQ7EQ7DLQ2AQ7Dh5Q2B3TQ7DVQ3BQ2BSQ22VQ7DLQ2AS,-@3Q234-q3

By MARK MAZZETTI
Published: June 8, 2006
A covert C.I.A. effort to finance Somali warlords has empowered the Islamic groups it was intended to marginalize, critics say.

oops found it here

http://www.iht.com/articles/2006/06/08/news/somalia.php
WASHINGTON The covert effort by the CIA to finance warlords in Somalia has drawn sharp criticism from U.S. government officials who say the campaign thwarted counterterrorism efforts inside the country and empowered the same Islamic groups it was intended to marginalize.

The criticism, expressed privately, flared even before the apparent victory this week by Islamist militias dealt a sharp setback to U.S. policy in the region, U.S. officials with direct knowledge of the debate said.

The officials said the CIA effort, run from the agency's station in Nairobi, channeled hundreds of thousands of dollars over the past year to secular warlords inside Somalia with the aim, among other things, of capturing or killing a handful of suspected members of Al Qaeda who are believed to be hiding there.

The officials said the decision to use proxies was born in part from fears of committing large numbers of U.S. personnel to counterterrorism efforts in Somalia, a country that the United States hastily left in 1994.

Then, attempts to capture the warlord Mohammed Farah Aidid and his aides ended in disaster and the death of 18 U.S. soldiers.

The U.S. effort of the past year occasionally included trips to Somalia from Nairobi by CIA case officers, who landed on warlord-controlled airstrips in the capital, Mogadishu, with large amounts of money for distribution to militias, said experts outside the U.S. government and American officials involved in policy making.

[TomInTib]

1. So THAT'S where all that freshly printed money went. nt

[seemslikeadream]

2. Somalia: CIA blowback weakens East Africa

http://www.sudantribune.com/spip.php?article18301

Somalia: CIA blowback weakens East Africa
Monday 23 October 2006 23:25. Printer-Friendly version

By William Church *

Director, Great Lakes Centre for Strategic Studies

October 23, 2006 — Kenya, Tanzania, and Uganda may suffer significant collateral damage from the United States War on Terrorism in the Horn of Africa. The Somalia conflict and the US War on Terrorism have increased the flow of weapons into Kenya and Uganda, spawned a regional polio epidemic, destabilized the relationship between Kenya and Somalia, increased tension within Kenya’s Muslim community, and created the possibility of an expanded regional conflict.

While the United Nations Security Council remains transfixed on pushing United Nations peacekeepers into Darfur, Ethiopia and Eritrea have extended their conflict by proxy in Somalia. Ethiopia, in an effort to support Somalia’s Transitional Federal Government (TFG) against the Islamic Courts Union (ICU), pushed into Somalia to retake the town of Bur Haquba near Baidoa. This sparked calls by the ICU for a Jihad against Ethiopia. To support Ethiopia, US Assistant Secretary of State for African Affairs Jendayi Frazer at week’s end then accused Eritrea of supporting the ICU.

The US accusation against Eritrea is not unexpected. According to a wide range of sources, the United States has been supporting the anti-ICU warlords of the Alliance for the Restoration of Peace and Counter-terrorism (ARPCT) with between $100,000 and $150,000 a month. In addition, there have been other reports of direct military equipment support through Select Armor, a Private Military Company (PMC) based in Virginia.

The US government’s military backing also extends to direct weapons shipments and loans to its proxy, Ethiopia. It has shipped nearly $19 million in weapons in 2005 and 2006, and it is scheduled to ship an estimated $10 million in weapons in 2007, which includes sales by USA-based PMCs.

Regardless of significant US military support to anti-ICU forces, the ICU consolidated their control over much of southern Somalia this week after they took the key port city of Kismayo, near the Kenya border. This recent push by the ICU has increased the Somalia refugee flow into northeast Kenya, which adds to the risk of destabilizing Kenya.



http://blogs.abcnews.com/theblotter/2007/01/us_special_forc.html

U.S. Special Forces Engaged in Operations on the Ground in Somalia
January 09, 2007 1:59 PM

Alexis Debat Reports:

U.S. special forces are working with Ethiopian troops on the ground in operations inside Somalia today, senior U.S. and French military sources tell ABC News.

The sources declined to describe details of today's mission but said U.S. special forces, including a significant CIA presence, have been involved in numerous such missions, operating from a large American base camp known as "Camp Le Monier," established in the French protectorate of Djibouti following 9/11.

There are approximately 3,000 American special forces and U.S. military soldiers based at "Camp Le Monier," which has become a major reconnaissance and staging base in the fight against al Qaeda in the region.

[malaise]

3. So now Bushco has settled this by

bombing innocent people to death.

[seemslikeadream]

4. US accused of covert operations in Somalia

http://observer.guardian.co.uk/world/story/0,,1868920,00.html



Emails suggest that the CIA knew of plans by private military companies to breach UN rules

Antony Barnett and Patrick Smith
Sunday September 10, 2006
The Observer


Dramatic evidence that America is involved in illegal mercenary operations in east Africa has emerged in a string of confidential emails seen by The Observer. The leaked communications between US private military companies suggest the CIA had knowledge of the plans to run covert military operations inside Somalia - against UN rulings - and they hint at involvement of British security firms.
The emails, dated June this year, reveal how US firms have been planning undercover missions in support of President Abdullahi Yusuf's transitional federal government - founded with UN backing in 2004 - against the Supreme Islamic Courts Council - a radical Muslim militia which took control of Mogadishu, the country's capital, also in June promising national unity under Sharia law.


Evidence of foreign involvement in the conflict would not only breach the UN arms embargo but could destabilise the entire region.
One email dated Friday, 16 June, is from Michele Ballarin, chief executive of Select Armor - a US military firm based in Virginia. Ballarin's email was sent to a number of individuals including Chris Farina of the Florida-based military company ATS Worldwide.

Ballarin said: 'Boys: Successful meeting with President Abdullay Yussef and his chief staff personnel in Nairobi, Kenya on Tuesday ... where he invited us to his private hotel suite flacked by security detail ... He has appointed is chief of presidential protocol as our go to during this phase.'

She refers to one 'closed-door meeting' with a senior UN figure and mentions there are 'a number of Brit security firms' also looking to get involved.


http://quebec.indymedia.org/en/node/26375?PHPSESSID=2373c17b48c4cbf74a5f522fec0447f4
CIA with Ethiopia vs Somalia: another U.S. proxy war